~SEVENTEEN~

 

 

“What is he, Mr. Emiohe?”

Dazhoun Emiohe’s smile remained soft as he looked upon the striking woman who eyed him with strong currents of hope and horror. Jillian Avery’s condition had been upgraded to ‘good’ by her doctor. The news had sparked questions about all that had happened.

They were questions no different from the ones she’d always had. This time however, Jill prayed answers would at long last follow.

Dazhoun Emiohe looked from Jillian back to Lilia who had spoken. “There is no real name for what he becomes, child.”

Across the room, Fystian sighed, sounding as though the response was one he’d expected.

“That’s hard to believe after all these years,” Suri sided with her brother’s unspoken disbelief. She too had come to sit with Jillian when the woman woke confused and upset over the events of the previous night. The Avery women had noticeably calmed as Suriaya watched over them.

Dazhoun Emiohe took no offense to the skepticism. “Evil is such an encompassing and accurate descriptor, my guess is no one ever saw the need to try improving upon it.”

“Good point,” Caspian chuckled from his leaning stance against the door frame of the bedroom suite.

Jillian had asked to meet the Akintunde sibling shortly before Suri left to ask Dazhoun Emiohe to share what he’d told them with Lilia and her mother. Everyone prayed the woman’s condition wouldn’t reverse after she met Caspian. If anything Jillian seemed content, powerfully so when she noted the kindness in Caspian’s riveting eyes. Jill said the feature set him leagues apart from being his father’s mirror image. The declaration seemed to have the same calming effect on Caspian when he heard it.

“Why’s he so obsessed with Lilia?”

Emiohe bristled at Fystian’s question and then shook his head stiffly. “I don’t rightly know, son. I can tell you that we are on our way to those who should be able to tell you more. For now,” he tracked an astute look between Lilia and Fystian, “I can only gauge that it has a connection to whatever brought the two of you together. Your guardians tell me that this beauty has quite an effect on you.”

Fystian didn’t try to mask the accuracy of the man’s words. “That’s the damn truth,” he confessed, holding Lilia with the unwavering intensity of his stare.

***

 

Manhattan, New York~

 

“A unanimous decision,” Chad Efthim groaned as he swiveled the round black leather chair to and fro.

“Does that surprise you, my love?”

Chad’s well-preserved features softened when he cast a smile to the woman kneeling beside his chair. She gazed upon him with desire and a sliver of concern pooling her coffee brown stare.

“Only once has there ever been a vote for suppression,” he said, “and even then they couldn’t pull it off.”

“Yet they’ve done it anyway,” Ula Efthim accepted her husband’s hand and took her place on his lap. “What does that mean?” she asked.

Chad’s lashes fluttered down over his probing eyes when he shook his head morosely. “It means our old friend really screwed himself this time.”

“But he hasn’t been the same for a long time,” Ula championed.

“Perhaps it’s the gods’ way of telling him he’s finished.” Chad snorted out a laugh. “Of course such a thing would only motivate the fool to reclaim what he lost by any means.”

Ula made a pretense of straightening the perfectly knotted tie at Chad’s throat. “What happens now?”

“The tribe is not happy about the attack on the woman and her daughter.”

Ula appeared more troubled then, her hand faltering over her husband’s tie. “What is it about two mortals that has Arem so crazed?” She didn’t notice the twang of jealousy that rippled through her voice.

Chad appeared too engrossed in his own thoughts to notice his wife’s demeanor. “The tribe can’t afford to have even one of us going off rogue. We claim a substantial number of members, but they measure a small amount next to the other tribes. We can’t afford them coming against us because of a member we can’t control.”

Ula stiffened. “Could they do that?”

Chad smiled adoringly at his wife. Sometimes he forgot how young she was. The Buruku had ridden a successful wave driven by evil deeds for centuries. His sweet Ula had not yet taken life during the times when the future of the Buruku was as uncertain as the next breath.

“A tribe can most certainly be suppressed, Sweet,” he tweaked her nose. “But it takes a group of special members from each tribe to put that into play. Only once, thousands of years ago, had the necessary members been on hand to pull off such a coup.” Chad’s gaze tracked something in the distance as though he were looking off into his past.

“Then we were only one- not yet a tribe.”

Ula took both Chad’s hands in his and held them to her chest. “You’re the tribe’s chief representative. What would they have you do?”

“What I don’t want, but what I know is best for us all,” Misery placed a shadow over Chad Efthim’s light caramel toned face. “They would have me betray a friend.” Twice in a lifetime, he added silently.